Iran war live: Iran says US seeks ‘exit’ from region, Israel pounds Gaza

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian has vowed continued support for the country’s armed forces, according to the country’s state-run news agency, IRNA.

IRNA says Pezeshkian told his cabinet that the government will spare no effort within its purview to secure the needs of the armed forces and strengthen the country’s defence power.

He stressed the need for the cooperation of all executive bodies in the country to achieve this.

I’m currently in Western Zawtar, a village in south Lebanon, the first pilot zone agreed on between Lebanon and Israel during the negotiations.

There’s lots of destruction around.

We’re hearing that during the negotiations, there are requests from Israel, conveyed and stressed by the United States, that there needs to be a verification process, which means Israel and the United States need other countries to send troops to these areas, including starting from Zawtar and then going towards south Lebanon to verify that there is no presence of Hezbollah in these areas.

Only then can people return and start rebuilding.

Zawtar wasn’t actually occupied completely. To the south, there are more and more villages, some of which have been completely erased.

There appears to be a systematic Israeli attempt to uproot life from the main areas on the border with Israel in what’s called the “yellow zone”.

The towns and villages in that zone have been erased.

The big question is, what’s the aim of that? Is it just to keep these areas without people, or are there other intentions?

The Israeli human rights organisation B’Tselem says 47 Palestinian families in the Jordan Valley are facing imminent displacement after Israeli forces and settlers cut off their water supply.

More than 300 people, nearly half of them children, are at risk of displacement after the last remaining water pipes supplying families in Ras al-Ahmar, Tha’la and Sharq Atouf were severed.

Israeli forces are reportedly preventing the transfer of water to the area where Palestinians rely on agriculture and livestock for their livelihoods.

Israel is working on creating a separation barrier in the northern Jordan Valley called “The Crimson Thread”, which extends approximately 22 kilometres (14 miles) from Ein Shibli to the Tayasir checkpoint.

Qatari Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani arrived in the Saudi capital on an official visit to the kingdom.

He was received at the airport by Saudi Arabia’s deputy foreign minister, Waleed bin Abdulkarim Al-Khereiji, according to the Saudi Press Agency.

Hamas has condemned an Israeli strike on police headquarters in Gaza City that killed nine people, mostly police officers, and wounded several civilians, calling it “a new war crime”.

In a statement, the group rejected Israel’s justification that the strike targeted “resistance leaders”, calling the claim “baseless and false allegations used to justify its aggression and cover up its deliberate targeting of civilian police and unarmed civilians”.

Hamas accused the Israeli government of “deliberately undermining these efforts and dangerously pushing towards reigniting the war of extermination against our people in the Gaza Strip”.

The group called on mediators and guarantors, “foremost among them the Trump administration”, to take “a clear and firm stance against this dangerous escalation”, compel Israel to abide by the agreement and hold it “fully responsible for the repercussions of these systematic crimes”.

Israel has killed at least 4,348 people in Lebanon since launching its latest war on the country on March 2, 2026, according to figures released by Lebanon’s Ministry of Public Health.

At least 393 women and 257 children are among those killed as a result of six months of Israeli military operations in southern Lebanon. At least 12,307 people were injured during this time.

The figures also reveal deaths in terms of the nationalities of those killed in the country, including 537 Syrians and 234 Palestinians.

At least 32 Lebanese soldiers have been killed.

Israel also damaged at least 17 hospitals; 179 attacks on medical personnel were recorded and 39 medical emergency vehicles, including ambulances, were destroyed.

The information minister of Yemen’s internationally recognised government has warned that Iran-backed Houthi rebels are planning to seize the strategic Bab al-Mandeb Strait in the Red Sea.

“The Houthi militia … is working to create the conditions for seizing control of the Bab al-Mandeb Strait by expanding its presence along the western coast and attempting to control strategic Yemeni islands in the Red Sea,” Moammar al-Eryani told the AFP news agency.

Al-Eryani said there had been a military buildup by the Houthis and that their plans had been illustrated by “repeated targeting of ports, docks, civilian infrastructure, ships and government naval capabilities”.

The Houthis currently do not control coastal areas directly on the strait, but they hold the port of Hodeidah to the north of it.

Hamas and other Palestinian political factions opposed to the ruling Fatah government of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas are exploring the formation of a broad electoral coalition before historic polls late this year.

Husam Badran, the national relations official for Hamas, told Al Jazeera that the movement has recently held bilateral and collective meetings with groups that include Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), the National Initiative and Democratic Reform, the Mohammed Dahlan-led breakaway Fatah faction. Dahlan and Democratic Reform have previously been firm critics of Hamas.

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Let’s bring you up to speed:

• Ali Abdollahi, chief of staff of the Iranian Armed Forces, has warned Gulf states against assisting the US military, saying it would be viewed as “tantamount to participation” in US attacks.
• Iran’s Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf has travelled to Baghdad, seeking to strengthen a “new order in the region”.
• An Israeli drone attack on a police post in central Gaza City has killed nine people, according to a local ambulance source.
• Israeli forces have also carried out attacks in southern Lebanon, including one that destroyed a home in Nabatieh al-Fawqa. Near Mayfadoun, two people were killed by a “suspicious object” believed to have been left by Israeli soldiers, according to Lebanon’s National News Agency.
• In Syria, Israeli forces have raided the town of Jubata al-Khashab and detained two people, according to Syrian state media.

Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Saree says the group has imposed three “equations”: what he called a blockade in response to a blockade, strikes on Saudi military buildups wherever they are located, and the defence of Yemen’s sovereignty.

Saree said that since announcing a ban on Saudi maritime navigation on July 20, Houthi forces had targeted eight Saudi oil vessels — five in the Red Sea and three in the Gulf of Aden and Arabian Sea.

He claimed the group had also prevented 48 Saudi oil vessels from passing and forced them to turn back, including 34 in the Arabian Sea and Indian Ocean and 14 in the Red Sea.

Saree said the Houthis had carried out nine military operations targeting Yanbu, Najran, Jizan, Abha and oil supplies in Saudi Arabia’s Eastern Province, as well as 14 operations against what he described as Saudi military buildups in al-Ruwaik, al-Abr, al-Wadiah, Marib and al-Makha.

He warned Saudi Arabia against further escalation, saying: “Any comprehensive escalation will be met with comprehensive escalation.”

Saree said Riyadh’s only option was to lift the blockade, end what he called an aggression, pay salaries, withdraw foreign forces and leave Yemen’s resources to the Yemeni people.

January 2024 was the high time of displacement across Gaza.

People were fleeing in large numbers from the horror of the bombardment across the northern and central parts of the strip and were pushed south.

A five-year-old Palestinian girl, Hind Rajab, was with her family inside a vehicle as they were making their way to the southern part of the strip when a tank blocked their way.

Hind was trapped inside the car after the Israeli military occupied the area and fired at the car, killing six members of her family.

Hind survived the first round of these bullets at the vehicle.

She called the Red Crescent Society to ask for help.

They dispatched two of their rescue workers, who arrived at the scene, but they were killed by the Israeli military as well.

Their ambulance was later found damaged by bullets.

Later, Hind and her family were found.

People here who are hearing about the investigation are sceptical that it will bring any justice to Hind and her family.

Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf says foreign powers are rapidly losing influence in what he described as a “new regional order”.

“Dear Abu Mahdi and Haj Qassem! This is the fruit of your struggle and your blessed blood,” Ghalibaf wrote in a post on X, referring to Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis and Qassem Soleimani.

Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis was a senior commander in Iraq’s Popular Mobilisation Forces, while Qassem Soleimani headed Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force. Both were killed in a US drone attack near Baghdad airport in January 2020.

“In the new regional order, the interference of foreign powers in relations between countries is rapidly diminishing; America is looking for an honourable exit from the region, and the Zionist regime’s project from the river to the sea has become nothing more than a pipe dream,” he said.

Ebrahim Rezaei, a member of Iran’s parliament, says a proposed Strait of Hormuz security plan would place the waterway’s management, monitoring and inspection exclusively under Iran and the supervision of the General Staff of the Armed Forces, according to the state broadcaster IRIB.

He said the plan would prohibit the entry of vessels deemed hostile, involved in espionage or a threat to Iran’s national security.

Under the proposal, the General Staff would also set rules for collecting transit fees and service charges from vessels passing through the strait.

Rezaei added that if Iran’s interests were harmed anywhere in the world, Tehran could respond against the state it considers responsible in the Strait of Hormuz by raising tariffs or seizing assets.

Iraqi Parliament Speaker Haibat al-Halbousi has called on his Iranian counterpart, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, to grant Iraq special consideration over oil exports through the Strait of Hormuz, according to the Iraqi News Agency.

Al-Halbousi said Iraq has been among the countries most affected by regional developments and urged Tehran to take into account the nature of bilateral relations “in a way that preserves Iraq’s economic interests”.

Ghalibaf said Iran was eager to expand cooperation with Iraq, particularly in trade and economic sectors, and to follow up on agreements already signed between the two countries.